Responding to the Bellingham Teachers Association’s Monday picket over an ongoing contract dispute, the School Committee on Tuesday released details of its latest offer to the union.

Matt Tota/Daily News staff

Responding to the Bellingham Teachers Association’s Monday picket over an ongoing contract dispute, the School Committee on Tuesday released details of its latest offer to the union.

The proposal, sent to the union in August through a state mediator, provides the BTA with a roughly $1.6 million increase in compensation over the next three years.

In addition to step increases, the proposal gives an across-the-board percentage increase to the teachers’ salary schedule in two of the three years of the contract. Teachers who have reached the highest step receive the increase over all three years of the contract.

Reached by phone Thursday, School Committee Chairman Daniel Ranieri declined to specify the exact percentage, saying only that it would be in line with what the union has requested during the second year.

The proposal also includes increases in stipends for teachers enrolling in graduate courses and for department heads, extra-curricular positions and coaches’ salaries.

The School Committee believes that the union’s president, Ben Roy, has not presented the union with a complete picture of the proposal, complicating the negotiations.

"We are not confident that the union president is presenting all of the details of the proposal accurately to the membership," Ranieri said.

Ranieri said the union has previously touted false information regarding the dispute as fact.

Leaflets handed out to parents recently gave the impression that teachers are working without a contract, he said. In truth the fiscal year 2012 contract remains in place until both parties agree on a new one, he said.

The committee wants to reach a fair agreement, he said, but refuses to capitulate in the face of intimidation.

"We have an obligation to be fair and equitable to the teachers, but we also have to be responsible for the students, parents and taxpayers in terms of cost and the ability to support financially everything the School Department does," he said.

"If Mr. Roy is willing to let us present our proposal publicly, we’d do it tomorrow," Ranieri added. "We have nothing to hide."

In an emailed statement, Roy said that the BTA presented the committee with a counter offer through the mediator on Aug. 23.

"Mr. Ranieri’s committee never responded," he said. "They say they are willing to bargain, but that appears to be nothing more than a ploy to garner public support and smear the BTA."

Roy denied that he had misrepresented the committee’s August proposal to the union.

"The entire BTA negotiation committee read and rejected the offer," he said. "Mr. Ranieri’s argument that the teachers do not know his offer is untrue and based on an illegally obtained, confidential PowerPoint presentation that he is misrepresenting."

Roy said that the deal that the union seeks was lifted from the bargaining table early in negations.

The teachers union has filed a complaint with the state Department of Labor Relations, alleging that the School Committee has "failed to bargain in good faith." A DLR board will hear the case on Nov. 19.

"Their original offer was a three-year contract with a 2 percent raise in each year," he said. "This offer was made while Mr. Ranieri was away on vacation. We met four times over about 10 weeks. Mr. Ranieri did not attend any of those sessions."

When Ranieri returned on March 20, Roy said, he "presented an entirely different financial package; one that was less than what they had been offering."

"It was a textbook case of regressive bargaining," Roy said. "His (Ranieri’s) claim that it is a ‘misunderstanding’ is insulting and ludicrous. We met with them and went through multiple proposals over more than 12 hours of meetings. They claim that they never had a chance to explain their offer."

Both sides remain in mediation, with their next meeting scheduled to take place Nov. 1 in Boston.